Mastodawn

Angry Metal Guy Oct 9, 2025

Heads for the Dead – Never Ending Night of Terror Review

By Steel Druhm

Death metal “supergroup” Heads for the Dead left enough carnage in their wake over 3 full-length albums to make grave robbers take notice. Led by the well-traveled Jonny Pettersson (Rotpit, Wommbath, ex-Just Before Dawn, ex-Masacre) and featuring Ralf Hauber (Rotpit, Revel in Flesh) on vocals, you know to expect slimy old school death metal of the Swedish variety with an emphasis on scuzz and grime. We lavished praise on 2018s Serpent’s Curse and bade you not to miss 2022s The Great Conjuration. Now here comes the fourth pillar in their death edifice, Never Ending Night of Terror. Will their tried-and-trve old school formula still prove fatal to the soft, fleshy parts? That big-ass machete on the cover certainly suggests the risk of bodily harm is dire. But will it cut?

As lead track “The Vastness of Time” bursts into being, Heads for the Dead shove an entire buffalo cranium up your privacy hole without a hint of social lubrication. As I’m slapped silly by their deathery, I can’t help but be reminded of the glorious debut by Rotpit. It’s the same kind of caveman Swedeath delivered by Neanderthal throwbacks and designed to beat your mortal form into bloody submission. It’s heavy, nasty, and festooned with scabby riffs and rancid vocals. There’s an element of actual melody in here, too, and the band slather a horror movie vibe over the top of the bloody death metal meatloaf. It works without feeling forced, and that’s a win. “Phantasmagoria” is a mid-tempo tank treader that rumbles through walls, hopes, and dreams as you flee for your worthless life. This kinda stuff is why I’m here. “In Disgust We Trust” is a sticky biscuit of brutal Swedeath with that original Entombed stench wafting everywhere. It’s good, unclean fun for a fucked up family.

The one-two combo of “Give Me Life” and “Harvester” will peel the paint off your prized My Pretty Pony® collection with the obnoxiously primitive d-beat onslaught and assortment of riffs, chugs, and blasts. It’s not like Heads for the Dead are reinventing the steel, but they’re churning out military-grade Swedeath that will leave unsightly blemishes on your chesticles. Not every song hits with the same barbed wire wombbat, however. “Death Mask” is decent, but doesn’t stick with me aside from the opening threat that “You are all FUCKING DOOMED!” The title track goes all in on big horror ambiance, but it ends up more style over substance and leaves me wanting. Likewise, album closer “Witchkrieg” is intended as a tribute to famed horror soundtrack act Goblin, and features their kind of dated 70s synth noodling in the context of a death metal song. It’s fun but doesn’t completely gel. At 41 minutes, Never Ending Night of Terror has more ups than downs and doesn’t feel too never-ending, but some points do feel drawn out.

Jonny Pettersson handles guitar, bass, and keys. He’s an ace riff meister and delivers a bruising collection of Swedeath-style leads across the album. I’m a big fan of his beefy, burly mid-tempo power chugs, and he showcases some wild solo work at various points too. Ralf Hauber, the vocalist for Rotpit, does a very similar style of death croakery here. I’m a huge fan of his booming reverb-drenched delivery and how he sounds like a foul voice on the wind. Matt Molite of Sentient Horror rises from the wilds of Long Island to man the kit, and he abuses it and the listener with a thundering performance that will cause PTSD. Naturally, the presence of both Pettersson and Hauber does make this sound quite Rotpit-adjacent, but that’s fine by me. The horror aesthetics give it a somewhat unique identity, and most of the songs deliver basic but fun ear abuse.

Heads for the Dead are a consistently entertaining project from a highly seasoned crew of scuzz merchants. Never Ending Night of Terror has some A-list cuts and some lesser evils too, but overall it’s a solid dose of toxic goo with decent replay value. If you’re going to suffer a long night of terror this October, this isn’t bad company to do it with. When it comes to heads for the dead, you gotta catch ’em all.

Rating: 3.0/5.0
DR: 6 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps mp3
Label: Pulverised
Websites: facebook.com/headsforthedead | instagram.com/headsforthedead
Releases Worldwide: October 10th, 2025

#2025 #30 #DeathMetal #HeadsForTheDead #InternationalMetal #JustBeforeDawn #PulverisedRecords #RevelInFlesh #Review #Reviews #Rotpit #SentientHorror #Wombbath

Tom Servo #FuckTrump Jun 5, 2025

Is Just Before Dawn Another Slasher Classic?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lgTIGqyjgFM&ab_channel=TheHorrorGeek
#TheHorrorGeek #MikeBracken #SickFlicks #JustBeforeDawn #GeorgeKennedy #GreggHenry #JeffLieberman #HorrorMovie #HorrorMovies #HorrorFam #MutantFam

Is Just Before Dawn Another Slasher Classic?

YouTube

Cinéphile NostalGeek Nov 10, 2024

Survivance (1981)

☆☆☆☆

Un slasher doublé d’un survival forestier… dénué de la moindre originalité et où l'on s’ennuie.

✍️ La suite ici :
https://www.senscritique.com/film/survivance/critique/311978038

#Survivance #JustBeforeDawn #GeorgeKennedy #Film #Cinema #Horreur #Slasher

Survivance (1981) - RENGER

Cinq amis décident de partir camper le temps d’un week-end en pleine forêt. Les autochtones du coin leur déconseillent de s’y aventurer, mais ils n’en...

SensCritique

Angry Metal Guy Oct 4, 2024

Infern – Turn of the Tide Review

By Steel Druhm

My second Soundcloud death metal promo in the matter of a week? Seems time is moving backward as I slowly devolve into a knuckle-dragging proto-man with outmoded tech. Turn of the Tide, the debut by French act Infern isn’t the worst soundtrack for a Neanderthal revival as it’s heavily inspired by none other than the mighty Bolt Thrower. Bands taking inspiration from the original War Masters are plentiful, but when that core sound is repurposed, good things can happen no matter how many times you’ve heard the formula before. Can Infern keep things on the safe side of the DMZ and avoid the landmines of rote imitation and generic cloning? The way through is forward, so let’s take a step into the bloody mud and hope we don’t hear a little clicking sound.

Opener “Undertow” is guaranteed to light up the battlefield for most death fanciers. It’s a rallying point for all the beloved tropes of the aforementioned iconic U.K. band and Infern know their stuff. The riffs channel the same grinding, unstoppable Panzer division momentum, the heaviness is oppressive and the use of force is excessive. This could have appeared on Those Once Loyal and nothing would seem amiss. It’s imitation sure, but a very good one. Tracks like “Gaining Ground” keep the assault moving ever forward, blasting and crushing all resistance with massive riffs and deadly violence. “State Puppet Theater” also rides the tank coat-tails and delivers many an armor-piercing riff even as they spice things up with interesting melodic guitar flourishes at points. “Gaining Ground” follows suit with simple but effective latch-tossing leads and driving, propulsive energy. None of this material approaches new or original, but it’s done well enough to make an impression.

Lest Infern stamp themselves as a mere clone of their main muse, efforts are made to add a bit of their unique identity to the proceedings. “Phineas Case” isn’t too far afield from their chief influence but the guitar work is different enough to push it beyond mere homage. “Archetype of Brutal Aggressor” offers massive mid-paced crush grooves and also features blackened elements, segments that reek of Deicide’s stench of redemption as well as Slayer’s time-share in the abyss. Closer “Buried Alive” weaves melancholic, doomy harmonies into the fog of war, making for a moody denouement to the carnage. A few songs fall a bit short of the best moments, with “To the Extreme” being the least effective, but overall the material runs from good to better than good. At a concise 39-plus minute and with most songs in the 3-4 minute frame, things move along like a souped-up half-track and there are no issues with bloat.

Jean-Marie Grövel and Pierre-Loup Corvez follow the Bolt Thrower field manual often enough to show where their loyalty lies, but deviate enough to keep things from getting too predictable, imparting outside influences to shake up the recipe. They’re adept at crafting concrete-dusting grooves and remorselessly wargrinding power chugs and the occasional melodic solo is a welcome shift, as are the subtle blackened and thrash elements. These suggest there might be more depth to Infern than what this batch of tunes demonstrates. Julien Edwood’s vocals are very much of the Karl Willetts school of death roars, not the most extreme gurgler out there but he gets the point across effectively and then some.

Turn of the Tide is a solid if not exceptional debut by a band that clearly has a crush on a death metal legend. Since there are plenty of bands out there doing the “we have Bolt Thrower at home” thing, they’ll need to move further away from limitation to get ahead in the scene. That said, I’m the exact demographic for what they love doing and eat this shit up like frosted ape cake. You likely will too if you have refined tastes like yours Steely. Well worth a spin for your fallen homies.

Rating: 3.0/5.0
DR: NA | Format Reviewed: FUCKING Soundcloud
Label: Dolorem Records
Websites: infern.bandcamp.com/album | facebook.com/inferndeathmetal | instagram.com/infern_deathmetal
Releases Worldwide: October 4th, 202

#2024 #30 #Asphyx #BoltThrower #DeathMetal #Deicide #DoloremRecords #FrenchMetal #Infern #JustBeforeDawn #Oct24 #Review #Reviews #TurnOfTheTide

Infern - Turn of the Tide Review | Angry Metal Guy

A review of Turn of the Tide by Infern, available worldwide October 4th via Dolorem Records.

Angry Metal Guy

Angry Metal Guy May 23, 2024

Mortal Wound – Anus of the World Review

By Steel Druhm

The Vietnam War era was a grim chapter in United States history. The wildly unpopular conflict was fought with questionable ideological justifications in a half-hearted manner, dictated by murky political considerations instead of a desire to achieve real victory. In the end, nothing good came from it and the horrors of the war’s excesses left a stain on the nation. This bleak, bloody conflagration has become potent fodder for nihilistic films and literature, and it makes sense that it serves as the backdrop for the full-length debut by Los Angeles death metal mob Mortal Wound. Anus of the World is a nasty, odorous slab of groove-heavy OSDM molded from the same brutal thuggery as Sanguisugabogg and the rawest moments of Cannibal Corpse, and this gore-splattered opus is not a place one should venture in search of subtly and nuance. This is a repellant album about a macabre time and the band do their best to immerse you in the blood and terror of it all. Is this something you want to sign up for? Let’s see what you’re made of, maggot!

The album is littered with soundbites from Vietnam-themed films like Apocalypse Now, Platoon, and Full Metal Jacket, and the album wastes no time dunking you in a blood-soaked rice paddy on opener “Found Dead in a Bush.” Their style is direct, rudimentary, and heavy as fuck, taking a sledgehammer to your sensibilities with super thick death grooves, utterly unintelligible garbage disposal vocals, and relentlessly pounding drums. It’s the kind of song that pummels you and leaves you feeling like you need a long shower at a disinfecting clinic. “Tunnel Rat” swings close to Barnes-era Cannibal Corpse with corkscrewing riffs and stop-start tempo shifts and it shakes you up. The band’s low-tech Neanderthal style works well on these cuts and especially on the ode to napalm, “Engulfed in Liquid Hellfire” where they sprinkle bits of early days Death-styled guitar work into the mix in between ruining your face with fat grooves. “Spirit of the Bayonet” is a standout due to its strong Bolt Thrower / Just Before Dawn influence and the relentlessly advancing riffs that feel like a tank division you can’t hold back.

But when you base your whole battle plan around rudimentary, muddy mayhem, things must be tight and error-free, and some of Mortal Wound’s efforts miss those marks. “Drug Filled Cadaver” is too simplistic and one note, plodding along too long, and “Born Again Hard” is a good death tune run into the dirt by excessive padding, crawling on a good 2 minutes more than it should. Bloat infects several tracks, doing varying degrees of damage, and some songs sound like they get abruptly cut off. I like what they’re selling and want to buy it in bulk, but I still need the individual tracks to hit hard and fast, and the band needs to learn when to fall back. This is a shame, as the 43-plus minute runtime is entirely reasonable and feels just about right. I give them top marks on the use of the movie soundbites though. Sometimes the prevalence of film snippets can be distracting or irritating, but they’re used very effectively here. Especially the way they end this grim-ass album on a futile note.

Sam Shriver (Lake of Blood) and Peter King (Teeth, Lake of Blood) drop the groove hammer like Agent Orange with one ginormous riff-cascade after another. Their playing isn’t techy or proggy in the least with the focus on assault and battery, and for the most part, the plan works. Sam also provides vocals, and goddamn, they are nasty and sick. He’s totally unintelligible and operating from the sub-sub-basement, but he fits the theme and music perfectly. This isn’t a band that will light up your synapses with creative twists and turns, but they do their chosen lead pipe brutality quite well. If they could trim their material down a touch and focus on hit-and-run raiding, they’d carpet bomb the death metal map.

Anus of the World is a very dark, primal slog through a horrific period of history, and by forgoing melancholy for savagery, Mortal Wound effectively captures the senselessness and insanity that ruled the day. It has enough shortcomings to keep it from hitting that next level, but the good stuff is quite impactful and the atmosphere is spot on. Anus inspired me to go watch Apocalypse Now Redux, which is clearly a major time commitment,1 so they did something right here. I’m excited for whatever comes next from Mortal Wound as they have a recipe for disaster that I enjoy. Maybe next time there will be less anus bloat. The horror… the horror…

Rating: 3.0/5.0
DR: 5 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps mp3
Label: Dark Descent and Me Saco Un Ojo
Websites: mortalwound.bandcamp.com | instagram.com/mortalwound_death
Releases Worldwide: May 24th, 2024

#2024 #30 #AmericanMetal #AnusOfTheWorld #BoltThrower #CannibalCorpse #DarkDescentRecords #DeathMetal #JustBeforeDawn #May24 #MeSacoUnOjoRecords #MortalWound #Review #Reviews #Sanguisugabogg